Battle of Jutland

The Battle of Jutland was a major naval battle of World War I, fought from 31 May to 1 June 1916 in the North Sea, off the Jutland peninsula of Denmark. The British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet under Admiral John Jellicoe met the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet under Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer in the last major battle in world history fought primarily by battleships; the British suffered heavy losses and failed to decisively defeat the German fleet, but they succeeded in denying the German fleet access to both the United Kingdom and the Atlantic Ocean, containing the High Seas Fleet for the rest of the war. As a result, the Germans were forced to continue unrestricted submarine warfare against the Allies, as only their submarines could make it through the British blockade.

Background
Germany was desperate to break the naval blockade imposed by Britain's Royal Navy, which controlled the sea routes through the North Sea and the English Channel. For a year after the British success at the Battle of Dogger Bank in January 1915, the German High Seas Fleet stayed in port. In January 1916, the fleet received a new commander-in-chief, Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer. An aggressive commander, Scheer ordered sorties into the North Sea in March and in April and bombarded the English east coast towns of Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth. Scheer's aim was to lure the Royal Navy into combat on his own terms and sink enough of its warships to undermine Britain's long-held naval superiority.

Battle
On 30 May 1916, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, commander of the Royal Navy's Grand Fleet, was informed by the Admiralty that the German High Seas Fleet was preparing to go to to sea the following day. The information, from signals intelligence and the Admiralty's Room 40 cryptographers, was short on detail but sufficient for action.

The Battlecruiser Fleet, based in the Firth of Forth in Scotland, and commanded by Vice Admiral Sir David Beatty, was dispatched toward the waters off Denmark's Jutland peninsula in the expected path of the German sortie. There, it was to be joined by the overwhelming might of Jellicoe's Grand Fleet steaming from Scapa Flow in the Orkneys. If Beatty encountered the German High Seas Fleet, he was to lead it to Jellicoe, who would destroy it with his far superior weight of guns. On 31 May, the German fleet steamed northward with its battle cruisers, commanded by Vice Admiral Franz von Hipper, in the lead, and Admiral Scheer's main fleet following.

Mighty confrontation
Hipepr's forces consisted of 99 warships, including 16 modern battleships and 5 battlecruisers. The British had 151 warships at sea, including 28 battleships and nine battlecruisers. Scheer's position was precarious. Bad weather prevented the Germans from using airships for reconnaissance. The British, for their part, did not make best use of their intelligence, as little of the information had reached Jellicoe.

It was a surprise to both sides when their battlecruiser forces made contact in the early afternoon. Hipper quickly turned southward to draw Beatty towards Scheer's main force. Beatty gave chase. He had more battlecruisers than Hipper and four of the latest Queen Elizabeth class battleships in support. However, the battleships lagged behind, and the exchange of fire between the rival battle cruisers quickly turned to Germany's advantage. German gunnery was accurate and the British battlecruisers had insufficient armor.

Tactical mistakes
The Royal Navy had also neglected to potect their stock of weapons against fire. In quick succession, the battle cruisers Indefatigable and Queen Mary exploded and snak. There were only 11 survivors from two crews totalling over 2,000 men. Beatty's flagship, the Lion, was also badly hit, only narrowly avoiding the same fate. When Scheer arrived ont he scene with his main force, he sensed a chance for a major victory. Beatty's surviving battlecruisers fled to the north, while the four battleships, slow to pick up the maneuver, faced Scheer's pursuit from the rear. The British continued to lose ships in the confused fighting.

Meanwhile, Jellicoe was drawing close to the battle area. Only hazily aware of the situation ahead of him, he deployed his ships in line of battle. At 6:30 PM, the rival fleets emerged from thickening mist. Scheer was taken by surprise. Facing a formidable line of British warships 6 miles long across his bows, he turned behind a smoke screen and headed toward home. Jellicoe now had a great opportunity. If he could cut off the German line of escape and force Scheer to fight, the High Seas Fleet would be destroyed.

As a cautious man burdened with heavy responsibilities, however, Jellicoe was aware of the great risks this action entailed. He feared that in the heat of pursuit his best ships might be decimated by German submarines, torpedo boats, or mines. As Scheer maneuvered desperately in search of an escape route, the battleships of the Grand Fleet twice had the Germans under their guns, and inflicted heavy damage.

German escpae
At a crucial juncture, however, German torpedo boats launched a covering attack that caused Jellicoe to turn away from the pursuit. The British admiral was convinced that, as night fell, he could position his fleet across the German route home and bring them to battle at daylight. Instead, under cover of darkness, Scheer cut behind Jellicoe's battleships and forced a passage through the destroyers and cruisers at the rear of the British line. There was fierce fighting through the night. Among the ships sunk was the German pre-dreadnought battleship SMS Pommern, hit by torpedoes from a British destroyer. All hands were lost. When day broke, Jellicoe learned that the bulk of the German fleet had slipped past him and was almost home.

Aftermath
The British lost 14 ships at Jutland, which was five more than Germany, but strategically the indecisive outcome worked in Britain's favor. The Royal Navy still maintained an unshakable superiority in surface warships - immediately after the Battle of Jutland, the British had 24 battleships ready to sail, while only 10 German battleships were in a seaworthy condition. Scheer continued to mount occasional sorties into the North Sea - the next in August 1916 and the last in April 1918 - but without resulting in significant combat.

In the wake of Jutland, Scheer pressed for the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare as the only truly valid naval response to the British blockade. This measure was adopted in February 1917, posing severe problems fro the Royal Navy and effectively bringing America into the war.